Can a bedroom fan save your baby from SIDS?

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/checkup/2008/10/sids_and_fan_use_for_weds_oct.html

There is nothing so immeasurably sad as the death of an infant. And when that death is attributed to SIDS -- sudden infant death syndrome -- the sadness is amplified by confusion and maddening uncertainty. For while doctors have given this syndrome a name for decades, and while it is listed as the leading cause of death among infants between one month and one year old, it's still just a "diagnosis of exclusion" -- the medical community can't fully explain why it happens and can only offer educated guesses as to how parents might protect their children.

This week brought another potential factor to parents' attention. A studyconducted by the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research and published Monday in the October issue of the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, found that infants sleeping in a room where air was ventilated with a fan had a 72 percent lower risk of SIDS than babies who slept without fans. The idea is that a fan circulates fresh air and lessens the extent to which the baby re-inhales its own exhaled breath...